My [29M] wife [27F] is upset that I did not surprise her with a vacation for her birthday. I instead gifted her a week anywhere in the world. How could I have handled this better?

So my wife and I have been married for 6 years and up until now we haven't had any major issues. Back at the beginning of April I started asking her what she was going to want for her birthday(4/19) and she said she wanted to go on vacation somewhere, but didn't specify where or when. I press her for more details in the weeks (days) leading up to her birthday and finally when I light heartedly say "Well I can't take you on a vacation if I don't know where you want to go."
Boom goes the dynamite.
She immediately starts crying hysterically saying that she told me she wanted a surprise vacation for her birthday and now it's too late to make reservations for travel/stay somewhere, and that it's won't be as special if it's not ON her birthday. At this point I'm so surprised that I don't know what to say. I start asking her whats wrong, and telling her it's O.K., I can still take her somewhere within driving distance or have a weekend at a nice hotel downtown. She cries for a bit longer, saying she is disappointed, and that she wanted to do something special ON her birthday. I'm finally able to get her to calm down when I tell her we can stay at a fancy hotel downtown for the weekend but it'll be $1500 just for the hotel, then another $400-$500 for activities OR, still go to dinner / date on her birthday, then spend the money we would have spent on a local hotel on a big vacation anywhere in the world for a week but at a later date (this was my original gift idea). She finally agrees but is still mopey for the rest of the night.
Her birthday rolls around and we go out, the whole time she makes little comments here or there. Things like, "Oh I bet they are here on a vacation" or "I wonder if it's her birthday", I power through, put on a smiling face, and have just an O.K. time. Since then she's made little effort to actually plan a vacation and has been in an overall miserable mood. I've tried to have conversations around it, explaining that even if I had known she wanted to be surprised with a vacation, I wouldn't have had enough notice to take time off work, plan everything, and keep it all a secret. Also, I only get X hours of vacation time a year, and that we'd have to shuffle something else out if we want to take an "extra" vacation (we already travel pretty regularly throughout the year). It usually ends with more tears and frustration.
I'm not sure what to do at this point to make things "right" again. Should I just surprise her with the "big" vacation earlier than she thought it'd be? What could I have done in the moment to make things go more smoothly? I love my wife and I want her to be happy, it really hurts me to see her like this. Any advice is appreciated.
TLDR; Misunderstood what my wife wanted for her birthday, still sleeping with the dogs.
EDIT: Thank you all for the kind, the harsh, the funny, thoughtful, insightful, hateful, empathetic, and poignant words. I appreciate the time and energy you random internet strangers invested to help out another internet stranger. After a long and now emotionally exhausting day, I need to get some sleep. You all have given me a lot to digest, so I'm going to go kiss my wife and pass the **** out.


Source.